


Without Words

by Rosage



Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Ashedue Week (Fire Emblem), Canon-Typical Violence, Canonical NPC/minor character death, Fire Emblem: Three Houses Blue Lions Route, Fire Emblem: Three Houses Blue Lions Route Spoilers, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-11
Updated: 2020-04-11
Packaged: 2021-03-02 02:49:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,994
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23597881
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rosage/pseuds/Rosage
Summary: There’s so much more I wanted to say to him.Ashe gets his chance and hesitates.
Relationships: Ashe Duran | Ashe Ubert/Dedue Molinaro
Comments: 15
Kudos: 78





	Without Words

**Author's Note:**

> For Ashedue Week Day 6: Lost and Found/Mutual Pining. Thank you to the event coordinator for organizing this!

_Dear Dedue,_

_I think the plants miss you. I’m caring for them the best I can, but sometimes I get jumpy and overwater them. They could use your patience._

_Some days it feels like this war will never end. The longer it drags on, the more the townsfolk grieve and starve. My knight stories never talked about that. Thankfully, the professor’s appearance seems to have given everyone a fresh start. If they can appear after a long sleep, like in a fairy-tale, then maybe you can return, too._

_Our class reunion wasn’t what I expected. You’d worry if you saw Prince Dimitri. I think he misses you, too. It’s so strange to think of what became of the Millennium Festival, when only five years ago the monastery held such a grand ball. Remember what a lively time everyone had together? You didn’t dance with anyone. I’m more graceful at sneaking than twirling, but I thought it would have been nice to dance with you._

_At least Mercedes is here. She was the one who thought I should write to you along with my siblings. Even if you never read these letters, I like to pretend you could._

_Sincerely yours,_

_Ashe_

* * *

Ashe’s fingers ache against his bow. He stops only to wipe sweat from his brow with a filthy sleeve. Blurry vision means death for his allies on the front lines, who rely on him to stop threats in their tracks.

A pegasus and its rider plunge into the river. A knight falls from their horse. He fights bile at each kill, none of it enough, as a squadron of paladins forces back Dimitri’s army.

Shouts carry from behind him. His stomach drops below the bridge. If they’re caught between two forces, their corpses will end up in the water below.

With the coast clear in front of him, he risks a glance over his shoulder. The sight makes him float outside himself: Dedue, standing in full armor, surrounded by knights. The sky bleeds red around him, lining his armor with gold. He must be a phantom, visiting Ashe on the brink of death—or maybe his mind has gone along with everything else. Sweat stings his eyes, sharp and real, and his face becomes as wet as if he’d dipped it in the river.

He scrubs at his eyes. The sight remains, as do the roars of the enemy general’s wyvern and the pounding of the approaching paladins. He nocks another arrow. Whether or not he imagined Dedue, he has to get his friends across.

Finally, they set foot on Empire territory. Ashe doesn’t touch down for long before he turns around and sprints. He doesn’t stop when he has to jostle his allies, or when Dedue turns in mutual recognition, or when their armor clinks as Ashe barrels into him. His arms can’t fit all the way around, and his nose is sore where it’s mashed into metal, but sweat and tears and blood from them and their enemies all mingle in a sticky mass.

Dedue’s hand ghosts over the back of his shoulder, returning him to himself. He jerks away, abashed.

“Sorry. I’m just so glad to see you,” he croaks.

The words aren’t enough, but Dedue’s smile is.

* * *

It should be surreal to cook and garden alongside a ghost. But Dedue is solid, and he and Ashe know each other’s movements almost without words. Everything Ashe wanted to say melts away when they hand each other saucepans or trowels.

Part of him wants to give Dedue the letters. Then he recalls what distance emboldened him to write: how he admires Dedue’s kind eyes and the handsome set of his jaw, how he would give Dedue all the flowers in the greenhouse if it wouldn’t steal their lives, and how, whenever Ashe’s hands tremble, he’d like to fill them with one of Dedue’s steady ones.

Scars wrap those hands now, and Ashe doesn’t think he should ask where they came from, despite how some soldiers boast of their war stories. Instead, he asks which flowers Dedue is happiest to see, and which dish Dedue thinks they should season with the herbs they tend.

When they train, Dedue praises his lance work. With lives at stake, Ashe can’t let his glow stop him from asking for critique. Rather than adjusting his stance or grip, Dedue offers advice from the edge of Ashe’s space, like he isn’t allowed to enter it. Ashe doesn’t know how to say he wants Dedue here, _here,_ closer than either would be comfortable with him asking.

Dedue came back from the brink of death to find his prince and world in ruin. While he picks up the rubble, surely what he needs is a friend.

* * *

A battalion fresh from the field orders more liquor than food. Whether they’re celebrating or grieving, it all slurs together in the dining hall’s raucous. The bodies in the room, warm, breathing, give Ashe comfort until he sneaks away.

The cat meets him in the pantry. Yowling, she rubs against a barrel of fish before looking up at him.

“No matter how good you think that smells, it’s getting salted for later.” He holds out his plate of wild poultry and root vegetables. The chunks of orange and brown match her pelt. Feeding a cat won’t end the war, but she’s in front of him, meowing by his ankle, and dropping her bites is the least he can do.

“What are you doing?” The voice almost makes Ashe drop his plate until he sees Dedue, carrying his own meal in the doorway.

“I swear I’m only giving her my rations,” Ashe blurts.

In some of his letters, he confessed his past thievery. The thought of doing so to Dedue’s face, with honor present in his very stance, shames Ashe. Luckily, his own honor is intact tonight.

Dedue sets his plate on the shelf. “I will get you more.”  
  
“Oh, please, you don’t have to—”

Dedue is already halfway out the door. “You must keep up your strength. In war, weakness means death.”

When Dedue returns, he brings more than the cat ate. Even if Ashe shouldn’t get extra, he takes it with thanks and settles on a crate. He knows what it means to have and provide food.

“What brought you here, anyway?” Ashe asks.

“I am not suited to the dining hall tonight.”

“It’s pretty rowdy, huh? Would you care to join us?”

It may not be a great victory, given that Dedue already planned to hide there, but it still warms Ashe when he sits on the opposite crate without hesitation. Ashe drinks up every thoughtful answer to his barrage of questions: _How would you have improved the food? What did your family do after dinner? Did your sister like cats?_

Finished eating, the cat jumps onto Dedue’s knee and curls to make a bed there. He sits frozen, his eyes so wide Ashe laughs.

“Most people here refuse to meet my eye. This is forward,” Dedue says.

“Cats are good judges of character.” Ashe scratches between her ears. As she rubs against his palm, he realizes he’s leaning halfway over Dedue’s lap. He straightens. “You know, she looks just like the cat in that story.”

“What story?”

“This farmer went off to war. He rose in the ranks as a valorous knight and was offered all sorts of honors, but in the end, all he wanted to do was go home to his cat. He found her in the barn, waiting for him to return.” His hands grip his own knees. “It seems silly now, but recently I read a lot of stories like that. I guess I just liked the idea of a happy ending.”

Dedue looks solemn, as if the tale deserves the consideration. Carefully, he rests his fingers over the cat’s back, and he smiles at her purr. 

“It isn’t silly.” 

* * *

Rodrigue’s death dunks the world underwater. There’s no chance of him walking out of a chasm or over a bridge. Dimitri and Gilbert lower him into the ground, and Felix kicks at the dirt, and every part of Ashe grows numb and weary. It could be anyone next, it could have been anyone.

It could have been Dedue.

He pushes away that thought, not wanting to mix up his feelings in everyone’s mourning. That night, when he sits at his desk to write to his siblings, he stares at the blank parchment. He promised himself that no matter how harsh things got, he would leave a little hope in each letter. He opens his journal, flipping through for a nice anecdote to include, and a flower falls into his lap. A daisy Fleche picked for him to press between the pages, a memory preserved, dead, forever.

He puts away the parchment. His fingers brush a handful of scrolls—his unsent letters. With his chest still sore, he pulls them out. It doesn’t matter if they’re silly, or if Dedue doesn’t read them. He could die for real, and Ashe won’t come back from that funeral to find his feelings still rolled up in the back of a drawer.

* * *

With everyone’s grief still raw, he waits until a battle draws near and he can’t afford to wait anymore. He finds Dedue in the greenhouse, tending to little blue blossoms. When he hovers, Dedue rises.

“Did you need something?” Dedue asks.

“I just wanted to give you these.” Ashe pushes the scrolls forward. Dedue takes them gingerly, his expression all business.

“Who sent them?”

“I wrote them,” Ashe says. Dedue’s gaze slides over Ashe’s shoulder, as if searching for eavesdroppers, and Ashe realizes his mistake. “This isn’t military-related. They’re personal letters, from a little while ago. When I thought you were…” Ashe’s throat tightens. He swallows. “I had things to tell you.”

It’s all he can manage.

Confusion breaks Dedue’s composure as he looks between Ashe and the scrolls, as if not sure which contains an answer.

“Of course, you don’t need to feel obligated,” Ashe says. Dedue softens.

“No, I will read them. Thank you.”

“Oh, wonderful. Um, enjoy!” Ashe scampers off without waiting for a response.

* * *

It isn’t hard to stay busy in war. Reconnaissance takes Ashe away from the monastery, and danger keeps Dedue at Dimitri’s side. They don’t even staff the kitchen or greenhouse at the same time. It’s impossible to tell if Dedue is avoiding him. Just in case, Ashe waits, as patiently as Dedue would wait for a seed to grow.

The next battle passes with them both alive, rendering his timing for the letters moot. Did he overstep? Jump at ghosts that weren’t there?

He is at the training grounds, practicing shooting in the dark, when he receives a summons to the dining hall. He arrives to a rich smell that seems to shrink the long hall and empty tables into a home.

Dedue appears, free of armor, sweat from the kitchen beaded at the edge of his hairline. He invites Ashe to a table set with a spiced meat stew, pickled vegetables, and flatbreads rolled thin.

“Please, enjoy the meal,” Dedue says. He steps to the side. Ashe cranks his head to follow.

“I’m sure I will, but what’s the occasion?”

“You are still giving your food away to that cat.”

“Ah, sometimes, but you didn’t have to—”

“That was not the reason.” Dedue breathes, audible and measured. Even the most steadfast person must get nervous. “I had things to say to you, too, but I am still not the best with words.”

Hope wells up within Ashe, enough to fill a hundred letters. “That’s all right. I’d still like it if you’d join me.”

He holds out a hand. After a long moment, Dedue takes it, enveloping him in warmth. The food warms him just as much from the inside.

If, after the meal, Ashe takes Dedue’s hand again to kiss his scarred knuckles, neither needs to speak of it.


End file.
